While the majority of Alfreds Cruising boats went North to Lake Macquarie, a few decided to go in the opposite direction. Amadeus and Te Moana went as far as Jervis Bay. You can read their day-by-day account on the Te Moana site. Reliance set off for Batemans Bay and ended up in Eden. Read Chris and Suzanne Daly's account here. And to top it off, Diomedea sailed as far as Flinders island. It's good to see we have some adventurous cruisers among us.

Reliance was provisioned and ready for a Boxing Day departure, weather permitting. Plan A was to head south to join the Sydney Hobart fleet at the Heads and then to continue south. Plan B was to head north to Port Stephens and beyond. The unequivocal weather resulted in us sticking with Plan A. After a somewhat tardy start, we headed out past Bangalley Head and found ourselves in a 1.5 knot north flowing eddy from the strong EAC!! Not a good start – after all, the current is supposed to run south isn’t it? This persisted all the way to Sydney, resulting in a late arrival at the heads, but we picked up the tail-end of the fleet and continued to Port Hacking, anchoring at Jibbon Beach (35 miles passage).

Jibbon Beach is a great anchorage in southerlies and is reasonable for moderate northerlies (lay plenty of chain). There are three public moorings and three RMYC (Port Hacking) moorings in the most protected eastern corner, which are often vacated by day visitors around sunset. These moorings could be considered more secure than anchoring, but the boat tends to ride up on the buoy and bang in the night if the wind stops. We prefer to anchor. There are some interesting walks around the headland at Jibbon Beach. Bundeena is a quiet, isolated little village that hasn’t changed much over many decades. The shopping centre is adequate for most provisions. On our return trip we ventured into Port Hacking proper – see later.